


Petrichor

by Sp00py



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Aggression, Butler!Grell, Clothed Sex, Frotting, Licking, M/M, SebaGrell - Freeform, Tears, dubcon, limited pov so, male pronouns for grell
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-07
Updated: 2017-04-07
Packaged: 2018-10-15 22:59:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10559130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sp00py/pseuds/Sp00py
Summary: Petrichor is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. The word is constructed from Greek petra, meaning "stone", and īchōr, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology.





	

Sebastian took his time turning down the lights, room by room, hall by hall, until only the three small flames of his candelabra remained in the large, dark manor. As he did one last, perfunctory round, he noticed a door ajar to one of the young lord's studies. With a quick huff, he blew out his candles and set the candelabra on a side table before approaching. If someone was foolish enough to sneak in, he'd enjoy removing them.   
  
His hopeful excitement gave way to curiosity, but not disappointment, as he peeked into the study.   
  
A slender silhouette that had become very familiar over the past day or so stood framed by the moonlight pouring in the window. He seemed unaware of Sebastian's presence, gaze turned outward across the sprawling, wooded estate, glasses catching the faint luminescence in their frames.   
  
Sebastian inched the door silently open and slipped into the room, closing it behind him.   
  
"What are you doing up, Mr Grell?" he whispered in Grell's ear.   
  
Grell yelped and flinched, only for Sebastian to catch him by the arm to keep him from toppling away and damaging any furniture or himself. The smaller butler was practically swooning into his chest like a certain maid, and he'd only asked a simple question. Sebastian would never understand this human infatuation with his mere existence, though it certainly worked to his advantage.   
  
Grell tilted his head back to squint at Sebastian in the gloom. What little of his irises that could be seen in a ring around wide, dark pupils seemed unable to decide if they were forest green or amber. Sebastian felt the heat of a blush on the other's skin, the tremble just under the surface. Such a visceral reaction for such a pathetic creature. "Mr -- Mr Sebastian! I apologise! I couldn't sleep. Usually I'm turning down the lights and locking up, you see."   
  
"Ah, of course," he said, letting his derision ghost across Grell's face. Grell's breath hitched. "You're actually the head butler at Madam Red's residence, aren't you?"   
  
"I'm also the housekeeper, too," Grell admitted, letting a small, rueful smile slip. Sebastian returned the smile, along with a questioning quirk of his eyebrows. "Only by technicalities, of course. Goodness knows I'm not very well-equipped for either role. Madam Red doesn't have any other live-in servants, though."

Sebastian nodded, mentally unpacking what that line truly meant. That woman was up to something, he smelled it on her when she had most recently visited. Guilt and rage and sadness familiar as the young master's. If she had too many servants, it'd be hard to hide her activities. But one loyal if incompetent butler…

"Oh, I do hope she's doing all right on her own." Grell brought his thumb up to bite at the seam of his glove, perpetually worried brows furrowing further as his self-depreciation gave way to fretting.   
  
Grell was a curious creature, almost like a fawn that the young master had decided to take in. Awkward and new, stumbling through the world on shaky legs. Sebastian had no clue how he'd found himself in the employ of Madam Red. Well, he had some clue. He himself had been rather awkward his first weeks as butler, too, and not all demons were as quick to adapt as he was. It was curious another demon had chosen the role of butler to someone so close to the young master, though. That boy really was something special.   
  
Sebastian leaned in close to Grell, breathed in a clean-soap, very human scent. He pulled Grell flush to himself and buried his nose in his hair, causing a stuttering outburst of his name. Fresh, normal, nothing to suggest anything about his person. Not even the faintest hint of blood.   
  
Grell wriggled in his arms but couldn't break free, and finally stopped moving. "Mr Sebastian?" he asked more quietly, warily, as Sebastian's grip changed, an arm around his waist, a hand at his neck, keeping his back pressed to Sebastian's chest.   
  
He craned Grell's head to the side, roughly enough to be painful, and licked the junction between jaw and neck. Sebastian could taste what he couldn't smell, a threat of rain like something dangerous. Something wild. Grell swallowed, and the ribbing of his throat shifted under Sebastian's tongue.   
  
"You're very flighty," he said against Grell's pulse, teeth grazing lightly. The hand at Grell's waist slid lower. "Very... excitable."   
  
"Please don't -- Ah!" Grell jumped against him, trying to pull his hips away from Sebastian's wandering fingers. "I don't --" His fingers wrapped around Sebastian's wrist, and Sebastian stilled, letting Grell think he could stop him.   
  
Grell smelled human, but it was flat and unnatural, a perfume. Those taste tones on his skin were far more telling, shifting between flavours like currents of oil underneath still water. Sebastian hadn't come across another of his kind in centuries, and never one disguised so thoroughly as a human. If not that he'd smelled a bouquet of sins and miseries on Grell's mistress, Sebastian almost suspected that he himself wouldn't have been able to tell. A slight to his ability he would not take lying down.

  
"I've had very little contact with others like myself," he said pleasantly, fingers tightening hard enough to bruise on Grell's chin. Grell whined a little. "They know to stay away from my meal. I wonder why you haven't."   
  
"I -- I don't know what you're talking about."   
  
Sebastian lowered his hand and slipped it under the waistline of Grell's pants. "You shouldn't lie. It's unbecoming of our aesthetic."   
  
"Stop!" Grell cried out breathlessly, overwhelmed, unwilling to break entirely from character. Sebastian observed the flush across Grell's skin, the minute movements of his body, his breathing. He'd had men, women, and other humans all respond the same way to his attentions, but his every intuition told him Grell was different. He shouldn't be responding like them. Sebastian would simply have to bend Grell until he gave way.    
  
He licked his way up to Grell's ear, let his next suggestion slither against his skin.   
  
"The young master is asleep, and your mistress is elsewhere. Neither of us is on the job, Mr Grell, so there's no reason to play pretend."   
  
"I'm not pretending, Mr Sebastian. P-please get your hand out of my pants."   
  
"You're enjoying it." Just to prove his point, Sebastian wrenched, pulling a tapering groan from Grell.   
  
"I can't help it," Grell gasped. "It's just my body."   
  
"Your body's human," Sebastian said almost to himself. He rubbed a finger across the head of Grell's length, and any remarks were lost in shuddering breaths. "How deep does this deception go, Mr Grell?"   
  
"What are you talking about?" Grell's voice pitched desperately, as though afraid Sebastian was going to kill him if he didn't answer correctly, but he didn't know the correct answer. His fingers clawed weakly, humanly at Sebastian as he squeezed and tugged, pulling more quiet moans and bit-lipped sighs from Grell.   
  
Cool liquid soaked into the glove where Sebastian held his face. Sebastian glanced down. Faintly, he saw the glimmer of tear trails. A demon crying, how unusual. Sebastian had had to do unusual things as well. Such was the price of a disguise. Why Grell had picked such a pathetic person as his character, though, Sebastian couldn't fathom.   
  
A lick revealed only salt and a tint of sadness at odds with the other flavours Grell presented him. It tasted.... human. Sebastian scowled at the idea of Grell being able to do something he couldn't. Pretend though he may, it was only Sebastian's body which was human, and barely at that. It could easily alert anyone who knew what to look for about his true nature.   
  
He released Grell to pull off his glasses, the chain snapping easily with one sharp tug. Sebastian tossed them away.   
  
Whereas everything else had resulted only in trembling, only in crying, that got a reaction.   
  
Grell writhed like a cat, no form behind his movements, only a feral need to escape. He caught Sebastian in the gut, then snapped his head back, knocking him on the lip and nose. Sebastian let him go more out of surprise than anything else. Grell dropped, a hand to the back of his head, face scrunched in pain, before he seemed to figure out he was free. He scrambled away.   
  
Sebastian tongued the cut on his lip as he turned to watch Grell. Instead of running away, he stayed on the floor, hands fumbling in the dark. It took Sebastian a moment to realise Grell was looking for his glasses.  He walked over and placed a foot on them, then put some of his weight on that foot. Grell froze as though he could hear the groan of the frame bending.   
  
"What were you before you became Madam Red's butler?" he asked, looking down at the crumpled form.   
  
Grell looked like a wilted flower, eyes flicking blindly around, fingers running nervously through some hair that had come loose from its bow in their struggle. There were still remnants of tears clinging to his lashes, sticking them together. Perhaps Grell wasn't a demon. Such weaknesses were unbecoming of their kind, projecting them even moreso. Being anything less than in control was not something demons enjoyed. It made him feel a little better about Grell's flavours, knowing that Grell was simply a human with blood on his skin and sadness in his eyes. A mimicry was of course never as exact as an original. If it was, Sebastian might as well be human himself. Perish the thought.   
  
"I... I was an accountant. For a merchant in London. I met Madam Red at the hospital, when my father was injured, and, and..." Grell dissolved into incoherent rambling that did nothing to suggest he was anything more than improperly close to Madam Red. But Sebastian already knew he was improper, if Grell's blatant infatuation with him was any indication. That woman probably loved having a man fawn over her so, regardless of his ability to do his job.   
  
Sebastian removed his foot and knelt to pick up the glasses, bending them back into shape. He ran the chain through his fingers, and soon that was fixed, too. Catching Grell's hand, Sebastian pulled him closer to loop the chain over his head, slide the legs behind his ears. He pulled Grell's hair up so the chain returned to its proper place.   
  
Grell watched him with watery eyes, cheeks splotched red, looking every bit the mouse he presented. Sebastian licked his lips. Human, but still hiding something. He hadn't been challenged like this in a while, but he would find Grell's secrets, those hidden flavours that tasted of thunderstorms and spice. He wouldn't be bested by a human.   
  
"I apologise, Mr Grell. I appear to have made a misjudgement about you." He cupped Grell's cheek, bringing a fuller blush to his skin. Even now, Grell responded to him. Sebastian had to marvel at how easily he slid back into his favour. Madam Red wasn't very kind to her butler, either, though. Perhaps he liked people being cruel to him or just didn't know what to do when they weren't.    
  
Grell's hand came to rest on his own, covering the unseen contract seal with a warm palm. Then, as though realising what he was doing, he fell back like Sebastian's hand was hot iron. "I’m sorry, Mr Sebastian."   
  
Sebastian couldn't help but let a smile slip free at that and pulled back, giving Grell some room. He had violated Grell's personal space, threatened and harassed him, bitten and groped him despite his protests, and yet Grell felt the need to apologise for simply touching his hand.   
  
"You don't taste like someone who is ever sorry."   
  
Grell's fingers came to rest where Sebastian's tongue had traced, then his fretful brows turned down and he attempted a scowl. "I don't know what you mean, Mr Sebastian, but -- but I am going to my room."   
  
He rose slowly, legs unsteady, and Sebastian let him get to the door before he sidled up behind him and spoke again, low, voice ghosting over Grell's ear.   
  
"I don't believe we were done talking, Mr Grell." Sebastian pushed the door closed again, and the click of its latching echoed.   
  
Grell cringed away, and wouldn't look Sebastian in the eye. His entire stance changed to shield himself, presenting only his back and shoulders to the taller man. "I am."   
  
Sebastian's hands came to rest on Grell's shoulders, squeezing lightly, thumbs rolling on the tight, stressful knots of muscles between his shoulder blades. "Then perhaps we can do something else?"   
  
Grell inhaled sharply, then gave the most imperceptible shake of his head.   
  
"Oh, but I think there is. Though I'd rather not send Madam Red's butler home with bruises. Well, not too many bruises," he amended, pulling Grell abruptly to himself, letting him feel his own erection. Sex wasn't appealing to Sebastian, not in a conventional way, but Grell wasn't very conventional. Sebastian wanted to dig into him, find the secrets in his blood that made him taste so dangerous. If he had to do it with nails and teeth as he pounded the smaller butler into a mattress, then so be it

Grell twisted in his grip, and this time Sebastian let him move freely. He turned around and placed his hands on Sebastian's chest. They were small and slim, slips of white paper on the black of Sebastian's suit. "Don't make me undress, Mr Sebastian. Please." The order was undermined by the slight shake in his voice, in his hands, but Sebastian nodded. Clothes, no clothes, it was all the same to him.

Grell's gaze slid away, and he caught his lower lip between his teeth. Sebastian wasn't sure if he genuinely didn't know what he was doing, or if that was simply his usual movements. Grell pushed strands of hair behind his ears and readjusted his glasses, then licked his lips, a pile of neurotic gestures and fidgets. If Sebastian was honest, which he always was, he liked the innocent persona Grell was presenting to him. He was corrupting this sweet, clumsy fool. Or at least he could pretend to, as long as the illusion held. But all games had to come to an end, and he planned to end this one tonight.   
  
When Grell’s gaze shifted again to the door, Sebastian decided not to move him to a more accommodating location. Grell might run before he could push him far enough to snap. Keeping him off guard was the best.   
  
Grell was tense, as though waiting for the guillotine to fall. Between the faint arousal and layer of fear he could smell in the small gap of air between them, Sebastian suspected Grell thought he was going to fuck him then kill him. Or kill him, then fuck him. Sebastian grinned at the idea, and Grell flinched.   
  
Without warning, Sebastian caught Grell around the chin and slammed him back against a bookcase, catching his cry of pain in his own mouth. His other hand curled tightly around Grell's hip, holding him steady as he snapped his groin against Grell's, grinding their erections together through the layers of fabric. Grell's fingers curled into his jacket as their kiss dissolved into blood and teeth. His protests were lost in pained gasps and sharp inhalations.

And Sebastian… Sebastian could taste layers deeper than he expected, like a still, dark sea. He licked at Grell’s soul, human but alien, an exotic flavor he could drown in. Would drown in, if he wasn’t careful. Grell’s noises were getting desperate, his clawing turned frantic if futile at what, Sebastian was lead to believe from other meals, was an indescribable pain only compounded by Sebastian pounding against him.   
  
Sebastian pulled back and Grell slumped against the bookshelf, eyes shining and dark, lips bloody. He gave Grell barely any time to catch his breath before he was pressing against him again, and only just enough time for him to rein in his own urges, turn his assault back down to more human levels. Sebastian could feel the solid thud of body hitting bookshelf, the coughing gasp, the rattle of decorative items shaking from the impact. He attacked Grell's throat, hitching him up. Innocent or not, Grell instinctively wrapped his legs around Sebastian's waist as he groaned.   
  
Grell radiated enough heat to scorch against the usual coolness of Sebastian's skin, and the pressure of his body, the rough fabric rubbing on Sebastian's cock made him ache to be inside of him, to shed his clothes and peel back the skin and layers of fat and muscle. These bodies were so easily manipulated, their responses simple to coax, even Sebastian's own false skin. He tasted Grell's roiling emotions in the blood and sweat he lapped from his skin, heavy and rich on his tongue. This was the food he craved, that he'd been denying himself in service to his master. If Sebastian were any less of a butler, he would steal Grell away to some dark place for slow, painful, pleasurable consumption. Sebastian hadn't expected such a deliciously, curiously mangled soul in such a bland, sad little body.   
  
When Grell came with a tightly controlled kitten mewl, Sebastian stepped back and let him fall. He looked down at the Burnett butler, who was back to being a lost, confused, and very well-used young man. His bow had come loose at some point, letting his improperly long hair frame his face, several strands curling and shivering with each deep breath he took. Tears were on his cheeks. He seemed unaware of the drop, limp against the bookshelf.   
  
Sebastian crouched down in front of Grell, drawing his dark, gleaming eyes. He pushed the fogged glasses up Grell's nose from where they had slipped almost off the tip, then let his fingers trail down the front of his uniform which had come untucked, several buttons undone, to the front of his pants. He pressed his palm to the bulge there before removing his glove, revealing his contract seal.   
  
Slipping in, he squeezed the softening erection, earning a whine from Grell and a wane shake of his head. Sebastian pulled his hand out and licked the smear of semen from each digit slowly. Sebastian didn't know what it was supposed to taste like to humans, but it had layers of emotion folded in, like Grell’s tears and blood had done. He could make a very good meal of Grell, if so inclined. Something to remember fondly for ages, though the getting of the meal would lack a certain appeal. Too easy. Grell was too pathetic. Suspiciously so.   
  
Grell rolled his head to the side, refusing to look as Sebastian traced his fingers for every last bit. He'd froze up and cried when Sebastian had touched him earlier, too. Even after all this, had Sebastian not been able to undo him enough to reveal his true self? Sebastian glared thoughtfully at the irritated skin on Grell's neck, amending his human assessment as Grell's attention returned to him.   
  
He couldn't be human, despite how everything about him screamed it. Sebastian had sampled humans from all walks, and no human tasted quite like that. Sebastian refused to believe this wasn't just a disguise. His tongue didn't lie, but all he could see was a man confused by his own body, the pathetic result of a repressed culture caught in the throes of changing times.   
  
Turning on his heel, Sebastian left the study. He picked up his candelabra, which flared a sudden, ominous purple before settling on a more normal colour, and did another round of the manor. When he came back to the study, Grell was gone, leaving behind only a hint of warmth like some spectre.

**Author's Note:**

>  ~~i kind of want to do this fic from grell's pov~~ i have very little self-control so am absolutely doing this from grell's pov, because u fuckin know grell was all about this going down hard and rough. but she is an _actress_ tyvm. and i could have come up with an actual summary i suppose but w/e.


End file.
